5. Tortellini 2025

Picture Credit: https://unsplash.com/photos/silhouette-of-personr-TzVN0xQhWaQ Many believe that the greatest pitfall of holding power is the risk of corruption. We are afraid to react to power by abusing it for our own ends, whether for concrete personal interests or merely for a power trip. But I would argue that there’s another mistake people commonly make with power—a tendency of humans that we don’t discuss enough—and that’s the failure to recognize that we have power in the first place. Power is simply the ability to make choices in a way that matters. We often associate power with politics, social influence, physical strength—ways in which people can impact other people. But all of us can make choices. Everyone has power, at least over their own lives. For me, the past couple months have been defined by a great deal of academic burnout. This is the “I haven’t checked Aeries since the beginning of January, why do you ask?” kind of burnout. Yes, that bad. The loss of motivation...

https://mantracare.org/therapy/stress/acupuncture-stress-anxiety/ Although sticking needles into various parts of the body definitely does not sound the most appealing or practical way to treat internal or external injuries of the human body, acupuncture is arguably one of the most mysterious yet effective healing medical practices. As a main component of traditional Chinese medicine, acupuncture has gained widespread recognition in modern healthcare, and while many still view the practice with skepticism, its benefits have been increasingly validated by scientific research and firsthand experiences.  Having played sports throughout my entire life, I’ve become all too familiar with injuries. Spraining my ankle, having knee pain, pulling a muscle, and even now, partially tearing my Achilles tendon, are just a few sports-related injuries I have sustained the past few years. Usually, to treat these injuries, Western doctors would refer to RICE —rest, ice, compress, and elevate—a wide...

We all love being able to feel confident in our abilities, but is there actually any benefit of being confident? I’m sure a lot of us have heard that phrase, “Believe you can and you’re halfway there” and simply just brushed it off, but it has a surprising amount of merit to it. According to an article by Trine University, there was a strong correlation between athletic performance and self-confidence, as self-confidence generally facilitated concentration and ushered in more effort. On the other hand, lack of confidence was linked to anxiety and doubts, clouding judgement and causing hesitation in intense moments.  One of the most famous moments that demonstrated the impact that confidence could have was during the New England Patriots’ famous comeback win in Super Bowl LI. Down 28-3 in the third quarter, there was a clip that has since become viral where Tom Brady essentially tells his team that they haven’t lost the game yet and that if they all played their hearts out, they co...

Time is one of those resources that we can never stop or reclaim once it's in the past it's gone forever. It is the one thing that is always moving forward and shaping our lives in ways we don't realize or don't know until we look back at ourselves. It also teaches us patience and sometimes forces us to accept things that we wish we could change but sadly cannot. In my experience with Robotics, Badminton coding and internships, I have realized that skills don't develop overnight. There were many times I struggled to debug a program or figure out the best way to CAD (design) the bot for weeks, But with time, patience and practice the solution became clear. The hours I put in eventually led me to success, providing that this time invested in learning is and will never be wasted.   It moves forward whether we are ready for it or not. I'm sure we have all experienced moments where we wish we had more time to prepare for an exam, to practice something or to spend tim...

  Anything is possible, as long as you believe in it. This can be taken almost quite literally. The brain is a curious thing, being the body’s most complex organ. It takes charge of all of the body’s functions, as well as affairs including emotions, memory, thought, and more.  The way you think can determine your entire life. Each person perceives the world, those around them, and themselves differently, and they are able to function based on those perceptions. A common misconception is the idea that “perception is reality.” Perception may shape your reality, but they do not equal to being the same concept. Reality is an overarching concept that exists for every living being in the world, humans and other species alike, but one’s perception of it is to each their own.  A person’s mental state can determine their entire world. This is where that misconception originates from. Simple decisions can lead to outcomes of varying degrees. Take procrastination as an example. ...

Power is interesting. It shows itself in overt and subtle ways, in eccentric declarations of authority and implicit, unspoken arrangements. It's the unseen currency that determines who glides effortlessly through the world and who must battle for each breath of space they occupy. Blake Lively calling Taylor Swift "one of her dragons" in a post to Justin Baldoni is one of those moments where power simply speaks without ever needing to explain itself. One sentence is carelessly thrown out in the middle of talking about a script change, but it has depth beyond context. To be a dragon is to be more than merely powerful—it's to be unstoppable, to have dominion, to be beyond the bounds that hold others back. Dragons, in myth, are creatures of unimaginable might. They may possess treasure, breathe fire, and govern their kingdoms with a power that no one even thinks about questioning. To call someone a dragon is to acknowledge that they don't just possess power; they are ...

Water. A substance so widely known and yearned for. Found everywhere around the world yet only accessible to some. A simple compound that offers many benefits. Sometimes it can be hard to believe that a tasteless and clear liquid such as this is so essential for our daily lives. Approximately 71% of the Earth is made up of water, of which only about 2.5% can be safely consumed by humans. The significance of water has long been identified even during ancient times as entire civilizations had been established around a single source of water. It is a major indicator for life itself as that is one of the reasons why only Earth has life out of our entire Solar System. Water provides the gift of life to all kinds of organisms and has proven to be important for living. It not only quenches thirst and cools tastebuds exposed to spicy food but also improves health and acts as sustenance. It has various uses as well, which can vary from being used to bake a cake for a birthday to generating ele...

  Every night before I go to sleep, I open my Kindle and enter a new universe. Here, there are no parents watching over your back. No teachers forcing you to do work. No rules or right and wrong. Either I'm at Hogwarts where you can perform magic and spells to do whatever you please. Or I'm at Camp Half-Blood, fighting monsters by day and hanging out with my friends around the campfire at night. The ability to fully immerse myself in a whole different world is what I call the power of literature. For me, reading has always been a form of escape. Whenever I'm feeling down, opening up a book will always lift me up because instead of focusing on my own problems, I can read about a whole other character who is going on thrilling adventures and having the time of their life. This escape from reality never fails to put a smile on my face at my darkest times. Authors hold a lot of power in the books they create. They include just the right amount of information about the plot in t...

  The first job is usually a slightly cursed rite of passage, a transition from becoming someone fully dependent on your parents to only slightly less than fully dependent. For most individuals, it’s some sort of retail or customer service, which always sounded unpleasant to my social anxiety and so I resolved I would never do it. My father delivered newspapers, distributing the gift of local journalism in cold Wisconsin morning weather on a bike. But my first job is one of the most uncool out there—sitting at the little-kids table at Kumon and trying to engage human beings a quarter of my height in an academic enrichment program that they are probably too young for. I don’t know why some parents believe their three-year-olds should be doing schoolwork—come on, your child should be playing with other children their age or, at least, watching brainrot on YouTube—but parents have the power to make these decisions. They are authority figures, after all.  Children constantly have...

https://eastfieldnews.com/25949/opinions/opinion-imagination-is-important-for-adults-too/ Imagine this: You are sitting in your favorite classroom, staring at a blank sheet of binder paper, waiting for inspiration to strike you. And then suddenly, you might start spinning with amazing ideas like a new story, a new solution, new invention. That’s how imagination works. For me imagination has always been a huge part of my life. Whether it comes to designing a new wax robot for my robotics, or picturing how my guinea pigs see the world, or coming up with possible endings for books I read, I have realized that imagination is not just about trade dreaming but it's about expanding possibilities. We often underestimate how powerful our imagination is. In robotics, My imagination turns a pile of metal and screw into a functioning machine before my team builds anything. We visualize how it will work, How it might fail, and how we can make it better. Without this ability to think beyond what...

https://paradoxmarketing.io/capabilities/customer-marketing/insights/how-perception-influences-interpersonal-communication/ Power is not always necessarily about who has the most money, highest position or authority, or the loudest voice; sometimes, it is about who controls the narrative and how it is perceived by others. Perception shapes reality, and in America, the way people perceive power often determines who actually holds it. As I visited different parts of the country, I noticed that different communities define power in vastly contrasting ways. In large cities, like New York or Los Angeles, the people there connect power to wealth or influence, including their occupations and who they interact with, as well as their network circle, while smaller towns relate power to reputation, community standing, and to who can rally people together when something needs to get done. Perception can also determine how we view authority. Some people may regard police officers as protectors of t...

  Valentine's Day has a strange power. It transforms the aisles of the grocery stores into displays of pink and red, inundates the feeds of social media with large and lavish displays of romance, and sends the solitary among us into a swirling kind of apathy and annoyance. It's a day devoted to love that half the population pretends to enjoy. At some point in time, Valentine's Day transformed from a holiday for love into a day of lament, where the sad state of our romantic lives is paraded before the world. It's a day when the givers and receivers of love are forced to account for what they're doing with their affection. It's a day when love is performed before our friends on social media and when the quiet, unassuming kinds of love go unrewarded and unrecognized. Ask a group of people what they think about Valentine's Day, and you're bound to hear a few disparaging it as a capitalist marketing tool, a day that makes single people feel especially bad abo...

  Valentine’s Day, celebrated annually on February 14, is typically seen as the commemoration of romantic love. However, it is really just a day to celebrate human love and affection, as well as to connect with loved ones. The origin behind Valentine’s Day is not entirely certain, however, all of these theories connect back to the ancient Roman festival of Lupercalia, held in honor of the Roman goddess of marriage, Juno. This festival promoted health and fertility, celebrated by sacrificing many animals in a brutal and bloody way (hence where the romanticization of the colour red came from) , as well as pairing people together . It was later rebranded for one St. Valentine, whose identity is not entirely certain–whether he may have been a priest, an executed martyr, or otherwise. It was not exactly the holiday we know it as it is now.  In any case, no matter how it began, Valentine’s Day in the present is a worldwide celebration of love. It is often spent by sending cards to l...

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Charles-II-king-of-Spain Dynasties are frankly, disgusting.  More specifically, it’s the way that sovereign dynasties try to maintain total power which is repulsive. Throughout history, it was relatively common for ruling families to inbreed in order to maintain a “pure” bloodline, ensuring that no external party would be able to squeeze even an ounce of power out of that family by marrying into it.  Inbreeding comes with a whole slough of issues like physical disadvantages ranging from limb deformities to mental impairment, mainly stemming from the issue of homozygosity. The lack of genetic diversity can often lead to health issues due to homozygosity making dangerous, recessive alleles of certain traits more likely to be expressed in comparison to regular reproduction. These defective traits can especially be seen in an autopsy report of Charles II of Spain, a member of the House of Hapsburg; he had a heart the size of a peppercorn, corro...

My parents have often emphasized the importance of staying healthy. This was often done by claiming that foods such as apples, or even vitamin gummies, give us strength and power which always confused me. I had always noticed however how people could improve in their health in a matter of days and how that had such a drastic effect on their bodies. The very people who had once been sick in bed or barely able to walk could easily run marathons within a week. I never really understood how or why this was so important or the power that the vast field of medicine holds over people as I do now. My knowledge on medicine has really grown due to the biomedical class I take. That class revolves around not only the different aspects of health care such as its various methods, professions, and procedures but also how technologies and research have been used to help the public and continue to do so. The field of biomedical sciences, especially, revolves around the research conducted to diagnose an...

  Science Olympiad has been an essential part of my life for as long as I can remember. It started when I was in Kindergarten and my sister was participating in Elementary Science Olympiad in her fourth grade. Then four years later, I became old enough to join ESO myself and after years of watching my sister have weekly meetings to study for her events, I was finally able to do the same. My first year participating, I had an abysmal performance, getting 28th out of 32 teams in one of my events (Estimania). After years of eagerly awaiting the moment when I could compete, getting such a bad placing was quite honestly humiliating for me. So, for the next year, I took the lessons I learned from fourth grade and practiced every single week for all of my events, tirelessly meeting with my partners and memorizing the content. Then on the day of, hoping I would at least be in the top half of the teams, I sat at the awards ceremony biding my time while the top six teams were announced. Fin...